Magical Mayhem

Want a book that takes you on a leisurely journey into magical realms, punctuated by extreme fight scenes? The Ropemaker, by Peter Dickinson, is a hero quest where getting to know the characters and exploring its very detailed world are on at least an equal footing with the magic-drenched action sequences.

The last time we saw our three heroes, Anthony Lockwood, George and Lucy, they had spent a night in the most haunted house in England and conquered a feisty and persistent ghost at the bottom of the Screaming Staircase. However, six months have passed since the incident made them famous, and Lockwood & Co. are not seeing any progress toward their goal of becoming London’s (and the World’s) most successful modern-day ghost agents. To make matters worse, Fittes Agent Quill Kipps and his team of young bullies are consistently on their backs.

Like martial arts, magic, and high school heartbreak? Amanda Sun’s Ink has got you covered.

It’s not easy moving to Japan, and Katie Greene was having an especially rotten day. She forgot to change from her school slippers—again! and ended up barging into a huge break-up scene between moody, gorgeous kendo captain Yuu Tomohiro and his leggy, book-smart girlfriend of the glittery nails.

As Kel surveyed the damage done to her room-- mattresses, sheets, and blankets strewn everywhere, desk drawers dumped out onto the floor, wall hangings sliced with a glaive, and that message scrawled so plainly on the plaster walls, she knew the battle to be accepted as page was just the beginning.

Gemma Doyle is furious with her mother. They may have the same untamed red hair and deep green eyes, but in Libba Bray’s historical novel A Great and Terrible Beauty they are completely at odds with each other. It’s Gemma’s 16th birthday, and try as she may, she is making no headway whatsoever with getting what she really wants for a present—a ticket back to Merrie Olde England where she can make her debut in society and meet some nice, eligible young men. But her mother won’t budge. Gemma’s to stay with her parents in India. And then something terrible happens. She gets her wish… at a horrifying cost.

Molly’s father was determined to get rid of her. Her mother, believed mad and kept locked away, had no say in the matter. After all, Diane Stanley’s The Silver Bowl is set in medieval times, and if a father wanted to drag his street urchin of a child to the castle and hire her off as a scullery maid, there was no one to say him nay. Never mind that she’s seven years old.

At home in England, she’s Lady Rachel and waited on by servants whilst living at the ancient family manor. She loves nearly everything about Gryphon Park—except being alone. But all of that is about to change. As the youngest child in a family of powerful magicians, Rachel is about to embark on a great adventure as she enters Roanoke Academy for the Sorcerous Arts. Invisible to the Unwary, the campus holds glorious wonders, age-old treasures, and is a gateway to secrets beyond Rachel’s imagining.

Maggie’s new stepfather gives her the creeps. Not only is he short and hairy and definitely not her Dad, but he speaks with a strange accent and spends most of his time in a shed doing who-knows-what. True, it is not his fault that he cannot replace her dead father, and her mother seems to really, really love him, but somehow that only makes worse the Shadows that follow him everywhere—dozens of them that no one else seems to see.

In Beastly, by Alexandra Flinn, Kyle Kingsbury is the kind of guy who has it all--looks, money, and charm. At his exclusive NYC prep school, of course he's going to be voted homecoming prince. It's a joke that anybody else even has his name on the ballot. Speaking of jokes, there's some new, chubby girl dressed in Goth black who's spent a lot of the morning glaring at him. She even called him beastly. How dare she?